Do you need a mission and vision statement (or why some people hate vision statements)?

As I have written numerous times, I love well written vision statements that are passionately followed, but I understand why people can think they are a waste of time or hate the discussion of vision and missions statements. For example, using Google, I searched for "mission vs vision" and the first result defined the vision statement as unchanging, outlining where you are going and the mission statement how you get there. The second result essentially flipped the meanings. These were the top two search results in Google and they had a completely different understanding of vision and mission statements! No wonder people roll their eyes at the mention of either one. But, it doesn't have to be this way, in fact it shouldn't be this way. I actually don't think it matters if you call it a mission statement, vision statement, a what we do statement, a purpose statement as long as it addresses three key points and it is followed passionately: The key points 1. It aligns your goals with the customers 2. Focuses on what will bring true success, not strategies or technologies 3. Defines your market and who you serve And to wrap up, you certainly don't need a vision and a mission statement as long as your statement addresses the points above.

Death To Core Competency: Lessons From Nike, Apple, Netflix | Fast Company

Death To Core Competency: Lessons From Nike, Apple, Netflix | Fast Company  I agree companies need to look beyond their core competencies and actually focus on helping customers achieve their goals. For instance, if Nike is there to help people get fit, then moving into fitness technology makes complete sense. That being said, death to your core competency? It seems to me that Amazon is doing pretty well, not killing its core competencies, but offering them as a service. Amazon Web Services and letting other vendors use the Amazon.com platform to sell their goods are two prime examples of this. As I discuss , Open Markets, their are three reasons opening new markets is a good idea:

Reason 1: Diversification
Reason 2: Low cost market
Reason 3. Different competition, competing on different qualities

Great vision statements and bad advice

I speak a lot about vision statements, in fact I think establishing a great vision statement is critical to success. One of the key reasons for this is because a great vision statement allows your company to focus on what will bring true success, not specific technologies or strategies.  One reason not to focus on specific technologies or strategies is that it is natural for employees to advise you to continue on the current path because that is what they know.  For instance, if your marketing department was built around buying print ads, it is going to be hard for them to suggest buying digital ads.  Not because they are dishonest or don't have the best interests of the company at heart but because it is what they know, the infrastructure is built to support the current system, and it is in their best interest to continue to buy print ads.  

This inertia is built into all decisions, from the smallest to largest. Things will need to get pretty bad before change is the recommendation and pretty bad is too late.  

The Coming Customer Workforce

I think we are entering an era where the customer's role is going to switch from a passive recipient of a organizations efforts or products to and active participant in an organization's success.  The seeds have already been sown in many different instances.  I categorize the models as follows (though admittedly there is no bright line separating these models) :

Affiliate - Here participants receive compensation for marketing for a company.  Amazon's affiliate program or refer-a-friend campaigns represent affiliate relationships.
Open source -  Participants actively contribute to improving a product directly and in return receive the enhancements others contribute as well, but rarely receive monetary compensation.  Drupal and Firefox are two great examples of this model.    
Crowd sourcing - Participants provide information or services that improve a product or service but the participants and others do not benefit directly from the enhancements, but may be compensated for their participation.
Financial - Financial participation is where customers contribute money in order for a product to be developed or improved.  Kickstarter is the most well known of this model, but traditional stock purchases could be viewed this way as well.
Marketplace - Marketplaces are instances where suppliers and buyers are brought together by a platform that serves as the marketplace.  For instance, Etsy or Craigslist use the marketplace model.
Participation -  Where the customer provides information that improves an offering usually without compensation.  Amazon's reviews or Yelp are good examples of this model.

The ideal model would be where a customer participates and they directly benefit and the organization benefits as well.  The best example of this actually working is Facebook.  When a user would ask a friend to join, the user, the friend, and Facebook would all benefit for the same reason, the network was now a little richer because of the new participant.

Definitely more to come on this...